Synthesis and reactivity of a 9-membered azaenediyne: importance of proximity effect in N-alkylation

Synthesis of a 9-membered azaenediyne has been achieved for the first time via intramolecular N-alkylation; the importance of proximity of the reacting centres via cobalt carbonyl complexation of the acetylenic moiety and not the activation of propargylic carbon has been demonstrated

Black Tea and Theaflavins Assist Healing of Indomethacin-Induced Gastric Ulceration in Mice by Antioxidative Action

The healing activities of black tea (BT) and the theaflavins (TF) against the indomethacin-induced stomach ulceration were studied in a mouse model. Indomethacin (18 mg/kg, p.o.) administration induced maximum ulceration in the glandular portion of the gastric mucosa on the 3rd day, accompanied by increased lipid peroxidation and protein oxidation, depletion of thiol-defense and mucin, as well as reduced expressions of cyclooxygenases (COX) and prostaglandin (PG) E synthesis in the gastric tissues, and plasma total antioxidant status of mice. Treatment with BT (40 mg/kg), TF (1 mg/kg), and omeprazole (3 mg/kg) produced similar (74%–76%) ulcer healing, as revealed from the histopathological studies. Treatment with all the above samples reversed the adverse oxidative effects of indomethacin significantly. BT and TF also enhanced the PGE synthesis by augmenting the expressions of COX 1 and 2, but did not modulate acid secretion

Characteristics of CVD Grown Diamond Films on Langasite Substrates

Surface acoustic wave (SAW) devices consist of a piezoelectric substrate with interdigitated (IDT) electrodes. These devices can be used to fabricate wireless and passive sensors that can be mounted in remote and/or inaccessible places. If encapsulated with CVD diamond, the SAW devices can be made to operate under extremely hostile conditions. The piezoelectric layer (AlN, ZnO etc.) deposited on the diamond or an inverse system can increase the frequency of the SAW device. Most piezoelectric materials (such as quartz) show phase transition temperatures below diamond deposition temperature (650º-1100ºC), preventing their use as a substrate for diamond growth. Langasite La3Ga5SiO14 (LGS) is recently fabricated piezoelectric material that can withstand high temperatures without being deteriorated. LGS does not have phase transitions up to its melting point of 1470°C.Here we report the deposition of diamond films by microwave plasma CVD in methane-hydrogen gas mixtures on polished and rough surfaces of the LGS substrates seeded with nanodiamonds. No buffer layer between the substrate and the coating had been used. The effect of substrate pretreatment (PT) was also investigated on the growth behaviour of diamond films on LGS. The resulting films are characterised by Raman spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The effect of substrate roughness on the growth behaviour was found to favour bigger grain sizes on the unpolished substrates. Whereas, the effect of substrate pretreatment (PT) was found to produce unique microstructural features with better polycrystalline diamond (PCD) quality than on the substrates without PT. Raman signals confirm the deposition of PCD in all the cases but the X-ray results interestingly show new phase formation of hcp and rhombohedral diamond lattice structures under CVD growth environment

Evaluation of saturated hydraulic conductivity from soil properties in an Inceptisol using different land cover and depths

hree soil profiles from Regional Research Station of Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Gayeshpur situated in New Alluvial zone of Nadia district, West Bengal were studied to assess the predictability of the hydraulic conductivity of the soil as influenced by different physical and chemical and properties of cultivated and forest land. The various statistical procedures were employed on the measured laboratory based data for comprehensive agree-ment of dependent hydraulic conductivity of soils as a model function of independent soil variables that is likely to be useful for different land cover systems. Soils are neutral in reaction, silty clay to silty clay loam in nature. Forest soil contained greater organic carbon (OC) (5.9 ± 0.16 g kg-1) compared to cultivated soil (4.4 ± 0.34 g kg-1). Jhau plan-tation recorded the highest value (6.8 g kg-1) of OC due to soil texture and cation exchange capacity (CEC). Soil hydraulic conductivity was greater in soil for cabbage and Sagun tree among the cultivated and forest soil studied with values 2.80 and 1.10 cmh -1. Correlation study showed a positive and negative relation with hydraulic conductiv-ity for sand (r= 0.68; P > 0.05) and clay (r= - 0.71; P > 0.05) respectively. Further, principal component analysis con-cluded that addition of bulk density with clay and sand can predict the hydraulic conductivity for different land uses

Determination of charge spread, position resolution, energy resolution and gain uniformity of Gas Electron Multipliers (GEM)

Gas electron multipliers (GEM) detectors are gaseous detectors widely used for tracking and imaging applications due to their good position resolution, high efficiency at high irradiation rates, among other factors. In the present work, position resolution, charge spread, energy resolution and gain uniformity have been investigated experimentally for single and double GEM geometries using an Fe-55 source. The position resolution measurements have been performed by a novel method, using a high precision instrument for source movement and is found to be highly successful. The result shows that the double GEM can resolve positions with sigma values up to 36.8 micron and 54.6 micron in x and y directions, respectively. To validate the experimental results, a Garfield simulation work has been carried out on charge spread

Strand-biased gene distribution, purine assymetry and environmental factors influence protein evolution in Bacillus

AbstractA strong purine asymmetry, along with strand-biased gene distribution and the presence of PolC, prevails in Bacillus and some other members of Firmicutes, Fusobacteria and Tenericutes. The analysis of protein features in 21 Bacillus species of diverse metabolic, virulence and ecological traits revealed that purine asymmetry in conjunction with lineage/niche specific constraints significantly influences protein evolution in Bacillus. All Bacillus species, except for Se-respiring Bacillus selenitireducens, display distinct strand-specific biases in amino acid usage, which may affect the isoelectric point or surface charge distribution of proteins with prevalence of acidic and basic residues in the leading and lagging strand proteins, respectively

Study of space charge phenomena in GEM-based detectors

Space charge accumulation within GEM holes is one of the vital phenomena which affects many of the key working parameters of the detector. This accumulation is found to be significantly affected by the initial primary charge configurations and applied GEM voltages since they determine charge sharing and the subsequent evolution of detector response. In this work, we have studied the effects of space charge phenomena on different parameters for single GEM detectors using a hybrid numerical model